Realizations and Actions
by thesnarkymouse
Summary: It is not so much the realization that is important, rather what you decide to do with that new found insight. A collection of short stories focusing on the relationship between Phoenix and Maya.


Her realization came rather suddenly. Locked in a dark room with no food, in constant fear that any moment could be her last, one would expect any number of things to run through Maya's mind. But only one thought did and that thought confused her. As she drew on the sea shell card in her hand, squinting hard to see what she was doing in the darkness, all she could think about was Phoenix. Sure, she thought about Pearly, about how to escape, about burgers, but all those thoughts seemed to fade into that background when compared to the other.

As she slowly sketched the spikes of his hair, like an intrusive thought, the feeling kept coming back.

You missed your chance.

Missed her chance for what? She wasn't sure. And how it related to Nick was even more of a mystery. But with what seemed like all the time in the world in this musty prison of hers, she was going to figure it out.

She finished her drawing. Not half bad if she did say so herself. She could just barely see it in the blackness but his image was there and it brought a smile to her face.

"If anyone can save me it's Nick." she thought, but even behind the optimism there was that nagging feeling of fear.

Maya tried distract herself from the idea of never leaving this place or ever seeing her friends and family again by daydreaming. Mostly about the Nickel Samurai and burgers. But her mind was pulled from it's wandering to Nick.

She thought about when they first met, how he had decided to defend her despite barely knowing her. She thought about all the cases they had gone through and how, no matter how bad things seemed, she knew Nick would pull them through.

And then there were the time between cases. Maya had shown Nick every episode of the Steel Samurai she could get her hands on. They marathoned the entire show in two days and despite his grumbling she knew he had enjoyed it. They would always walk to the burger joint down the street for lunch and Maya would sometimes race Phoenix there. She would always win but, for an old fart, he was pretty good at keeping up. Then there were times where they had to do office work. It seemed like something that would be boring but some how him just being there made it fun. They would talk and tease and argue. Maya would say some stupid joke and grumpy Nick, despite himself, would laugh hysterically. Maya loved to see Nick laugh.

Leaning back in his chair and holding his gut and fighting back tears, he stopped looking worried for a second and just looked happy. And sometimes, when he stopped laughing and finished wiping his eyes he would smile at her. And sometimes he would look into her eyes just a second longer than usual and it felt like time had slowed down. And every time he did Maya face would feel warm for no reason. When that happened she would turn her eyes away and say something goofy or teased him and Nick would make a snarky remark and the spell would be broken.

You missed your chance.

There it was again, like clockwork, that thought that Maya couldn't make any sense of. What was her subconscious trying to say? That she had missed a chance with Nick? What kind of chance? To tell him how important he was to her? She thought she had made that pretty clear. Or had she?

The more Maya thought it over the less sure she became. Nick was pretty oblivious after all. And maybe his importance in her life hadn't been made as clear as she thought. She assumed that just being by his side was enough to get him to understand.

Understand what? They were already best friends. They both knew that without having to say it. But they were so much more. She tried to find the right word to put to it. The word family and friend just couldn't even come close to how she felt about Nick. So what was it? What was her mind so desperately trying to tell both her and Phoenix? As she pondered this she thought about Nick again.

She thought about the way he smiled and his laugh. Maya thought of his deadpan remarks and the way he would roll his eyes at her before giving just a hint of a smile. And in court when he was on a roll and nothing could stop him, his eyes would sparkle with determination and she would grin and watch as he wiped the floor with the prosecution. And when he would win, and he always did, he would thank her for her help and wrap Maya in a hug. The hug would only last for a second but in that moment she could feel his warmth and the strength of his arms and butterflies would begin the flutter around her stomach. She wished those moment would last forever. God, she loved him.

"..."

Wait, no, rewind. She didn't just think that. Pretend like that thought had never even crossed her mind. Her face felt like someone had just set a fire under her skin despite there being no one to embarrass but herself.

No, she couldn't be. If she was it must mean that Pearly was getting to her. That was absurd, stupid, impossible. Why was she even debating this? It had just been a slip of the, um,...mind. Of course she didn't love Nick.

You missed your chance.

"Shut up!"

As her voice echoed in the quiet of the room Maya became acutely aware that she was, in fact, arguing with herself, in the dark, with an assassin just waiting outside for an excuse to kill her. Denial wasn't going to help anything.

Maya hugged her knees close to her and mumbled in resignation.

Ok, so maybe she had a little crush on her friend/sort of boss/sort of guardian/employe of her dead sister. That wasn't such a big deal, right?

She buried her face in her arms and sighed. She sort of wish the assassin would just get it over with already.

Authors note: Thanks for reading the first part in what will hopefully be an on going story. I'm a newbie when it comes to writing these characters so any feedback is a huge help and very much appreciated.


End file.
